Blogs

Larry Hodges' Blog and Tip of the Week will normally go up on Mondays by 2:00 PM USA Eastern time. Larry is a member of the U.S. Table Tennis Hall of Fame, a USATT Certified National Coach, a professional coach at the Maryland Table Tennis Center (USA), and author of ten books and over 2100 articles on table tennis, plus over 1900 blogs and over 600 tips. Here is his bio. (Larry was awarded the USATT Lifetime Achievement Award in July, 2018.)

Make sure to order your copy of Larry's best-selling book, Table Tennis Tactics for Thinkers!
Finally, a tactics book on this most tactical of sports!!!

Also out - Table Tennis Tips, More Table Tennis Tips, Still More Table Tennis Tips, and Yet Still More Table Tennis Tips, which cover, in logical progression, his Tips of the Week from 2011-2023, with 150 Tips in each!

Or, for a combination of Tales of our sport and Technique articles, try Table Tennis Tales & Techniques. If you are in the mood for inspirational fiction, The Spirit of Pong is also out - a fantasy story about an American who goes to China to learn the secrets of table tennis, trains with the spirits of past champions, and faces betrayal and great peril as he battles for glory but faces utter defeat. Read the First Two Chapters for free!

November 14, 2022

Tip of the Week
Backhand Counter Domination.

Weekend Coaching
I coached in four group sessions over the weekend, as is my norm. As usual the focus was on fundamentals, technique, footwork, placement . . . yada yada yada. I did do extra down-the-line drills - too often players focus on crosscourt. I also worked with two players on their grip. One of them has begun changing his grip drastically between forehand and backhand, with a wristy finger-down-the-middle forehand - NO!!! (1967 Men's World Champion Hasegawa might disagree - he used that grip.) It's important to catch things like this early, and the player in question only started this past year. 

I had a realization during one session, which I explained to some of the players. If the players can't beat me after I've coached them for a full 90 minutes, I must be a bad coach. But if they can beat me after 90 minutes of training, I must be a bad player. Hmmm... Of course, I also explain to them that if they are tired during a drill, they must be out of shape and so we must work them harder. If they are not tired then we must not be working them hard enough and so we must work them harder. And if they won't answer us when we ask if they are tired, then we must punish them by making them work harder. Hmmm...

I had a discussion with three of the parents who also play. (We allow parents to hit on open tables during junior group sessions. Some are pretty good.) The topic was footwork, and how kids and adults do it differently. For example, up-and-coming players and world-class players, when near the table in a fast rally, usually play their forehands with their feet parallel. But that takes a lot of training to do properly, and I don't recommend it for players who aren't going to put in the training and who aren't in very good shape. For most of us (including me), it's better to move the right foot back (for righties) as you move to play a forehand in a fast rally. It's not as quick but gives better stability and power. Another difference is the up-and-comers and world-class players often move both feet almost together when moving. For most of us, it's better to start by taking a short step with the foot on the side you are moving toward, commonly called "two-step footwork." 

I also had private session with Navin Kumar on Sunday night. Here’s video (15 sec). (I’m retired from private coaching, but made an exception for Navin.) Navin is somewhat of an equipment junkie, an EJ. During the session I asked him if such experimenting gave an Edge to an Ej.

USATT News and Favoritism
Coach Park Ji-Hyun & Coach Tao Wenzhang to Lead World-class Table Tennis Camp. This news item (which was also featured in the last USATT Insider) caught my eye as it’s basically an ad for a camp at a private commercial club, written by a USATT employee. This isn’t exactly fair to the many other clubs that also run such camps, especially other clubs in the Bay Area that run competing camps, such as ICC, Table Tennis America, and others. I contacted the USATT CEO and asked about this, and she responded, “We will have a section dedicated to promoting clubs’ events. We could either use the articles the club submits or we can help write them if they need some help.”

The problem here, of course, is that this needs to be equal opportunity, and it’s not equal opportunity when one club gets to have such a news item before other clubs even know about the opportunity. Since there hasn’t been any announcement about this, clubs still don’t know about this opportunity, unless of course they are reading my blog – and so, like me, they are probably pretty irritated about this favoritism. There should have been a news item about it, and among those clubs interested, a random drawing for the order they would be run. Or they could have a committee put together objective criteria for such camps, and select an order based on that. Perhaps better still, one article about all of these camps around the country, with links to them.

The club in question, 888, is an excellent one, with excellent coaches, and no doubt will run an excellent camp. But so would others, including my own (MDTTC), which has three coaches in the USATT Hall of Fame, four coaches who have won USATT Coach of the Year awards (eight in total), and two former members of the Chinese National Team (one of whom achieved a USATT rating of 2830) and both former Head Province Coaches in China. Ironically, my club might not even be interested since we tend to fill our Winter camp from local players, but other clubs might be interested. There are also camps, such as the ones at Samson Dubina’s in Ohio, that actively draw players from all over the country, who are likely not thrilled that USATT is actively promoting a competing camp, with no notice about the opportunity. Does USATT understand that if they, say, draw two or three players from one camp to the one they feature, that might be a thousand dollars in revenue lost for that club, not to mention a weaker camp? Do they understand that, once again, they are creating unneeded hostility toward USATT? (Addendum, added at the last minute – I just spoke with one club leader – not from my club - who said they are also unhappy about this, but do not want to deal with USATT anymore and so will likely not bother asking USATT to do a news item on them.)

Here are other USATT news items this past week.

Christmas Books
It’s time for some Christmas shopping, both for others and for yourself!!! Why not get one of my books? Or one of Dan Seemiller’s? Or one of Samson Dubina’s books and other products?

Brian Pace on the Road to Recovery
Here’s his latest update on his GoFundMe page. So far they have raised $47,638 of the goal of $100,000.

Butterfly Training Tips

New from Samson Dubina

New from PingSunday/EmRatThich

New from TacoBackhand

New from Ti Long

New from Table Tennis Central

5 Easy Tactics to Outplay Your Opponent in Table Tennis
Here’s the video (6:16). Here are other videos from Rational Table Tennis Analysis.

Ask the Coach
Here are the latest questions from PingSkills.

New from Steve Hopkins

Former Editor Loses Super-Close Election Race
Former USATT Magazine co-editor Marie Hopkins apparently lost a close one last Tuesday. She and husband Steve (author of the articles in the segment above) co-edited USATT Magazine from May/June 2007 through 2014 (46 issues). In the election for Representative in Rhode Island’s General Assembly District 21, Marie, a Republican, lost to Democrat Camille Vella-Wilkinson, 2603 to 2570, losing by 33 votes, 50.0% to 49.4%, with 34 write-ins. However, since the differences is under 1%, there will be a recount before results are finalized. (Side note – here is the page where I put together and update a complete listing of all past and present USATT Presidents, Board Chairs, Executive Directors, CEOs, and Editors.)

Puerto Rico News

ITTF News

2022 Chinese Nationals
They were just held in Huangshi, Hubei Province.

1965 Worlds – Zhuang Zedong vs. Li Furong
Here’s video (1:26) of that final. Here’s the Google [poorly] translated caption:

Zhuang Zedong defeated Li Furong in the final. 1965 Men's Singles World Championship in Ljubljana Slovenia The duo have made history against each other in three consecutive men's singles finals (Beijing, Prague, Ljubljana), none of which has been possible to date. But according to Sun Meiying, a former vice president of the China Table Tennis Federation, who had met Zhou Enlai more than 40 times, behind the scenes of such a not very elegant event.

After Zhuang Zedong won his first men's singles world championship, the first 'result lock' took place, as the above wanted to make Zhuang a three-time champion and become a national role model.

At that time, Li Furong, who was ranked behind Zhuang in the world rankings. Therefore, he had to lose to Zhuang every time when competing in the finals.

“I can keep Li Furong purely by hand.” Zhuang clearly expressed his displeasure. “When Master ordered Li to surrender. I also felt discouraged. Even now, people are saying that all my World Championship results are locked.” Li was also angry, saying, “I can keep Zhuang Zedong, but the Leader wants me to. I lost."

Currently, due to the strong ability of Chinese athletes This makes locking effect much less important. Until then, it was no longer necessary. Former China national team head coach Tsai Zhenhua said in 2005, “Today we hardly have any results locked. I would like to clarify that for the Olympic Games The interests of the nation must come above all else, for example, when comparing which of our athletes is stronger than the next foreign athlete. I think the country should be the first. This is my principle We have been like this for over a decade.”

TT11TV
Lots of videos here.

New from the Malong Fanmade Channel
Lots of new videos here.

Ping Pong Master Shirt
Here’s where you can buy it!

Table Tennis Is My Music
Here’s the video (1:53) from Steve Rowe.

Many-Paddle Pong
Here’s the video (9 sec, but repeating)! I’ve never rallied with a cat (I don’t think the cat minded), but I once stuck a sheet of sponge on the forehead of a three-year-old (with his permission), picked him up, and rallied off his forehead! I wish I had pictures.  

Gigantic Pong
Here’s the video (8 sec, but repeating)!

Mario & Sonic at the London 2012 Olympic Games Knuckles in Table Tennis
Here’s the video (5:18)!

Ping Pong: Expectations vs Reality 2
Here’s the video (8:09) from Pongfinity!

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November 7, 2022

Tip of the Week
Coming Back or Beating Stronger Players.

Weekend Coaching
The hardest part of the weekend for me was in the last of four group sessions – three on Sunday – where they needed one more player for up-down tables. I’m out of practice, haven’t warmed up, and have been feeding multiball for hours, and suddenly I’m up against kids who make the Flash seem like a sloth. Fortunately, this wasn’t our top group, and fortunately, they couldn’t return my serves, and so I was able to win all my matches easily. Biggest scare - one kid made it to 4-all on four nets and edges! (He popped one serve back on the edge, and net-dribbled another.) One girl hits the ball so fast that any rally I didn’t win on the first two shots ended up with me lobbing, and she wasn’t bad against lobs. She also gave me a scare when she suddenly backhand flipped in two of my short side-top serves! (Apparently she didn’t get the memo that she’s supposed to misread them and push them straight up.) She was jamming the table, so I switched to deep breaking serves and fast, dead ones, and that ended that threat. (I also chickened out and chopped back some of her topspin serves, which worked.)

As noted, I fed a lot of multiball. For some of the sessions, I mostly fed backspin. In one-on-one drills with other players, even if the drill starts with backspin you only get one opening loop against backspin, and then it’s all topspin the rest of the rally. You might get 3-4 loops against backspin per minute. With multiball, you get about 60! That’s a lot more practice, and why it’s valuable in a group session to have one coach feeding multiball backspin, with the players rotated over throughout the session. One key that many forget – it’s not just forehand loops, don’t forget backhand loops!!!

Pan Americans
Here’s the ITTF home page for the event, with results. I don’t see a lot of online videos, such as USA’s Lily Zhang’s final against Adriana Diaz of Puerto Rico. (Diaz got the gold, 4-0. Email me if you have a link to the video - I couldn't find one.) USA’s Kanak Jha (world #28) played Brazil’s Hugo Calderano (world #7) twice. Kanak won the first in the Team final, 4-0, but lost in the Men’s Singles Final, 0-4. Here are videos of both.

There was controversy in the quarterfinal of Men's Singles between Canada’s Eugene Wang and Ecuador’s Alberto Mino. Mino won the first three games, Wang the next three. In the seventh, at 9-all, Mino hit a clear side, but the umpire mistakenly called it an edge and gave the point to Mino. Wang argued for a LONG time, to no avail. He then refused to play the next point, and shook Mino's and the umpire's hands and walked off the court. However, the argument continued, with Wang off-court arguing with Mino, who remained in the court for a time, along with the umpires. Here's the video - it should take you to 2:05:28, 9-all in the seventh. (Thanks to Greg Mascialino, who messaged me the link.) 

Here is Pan Am coverage by Steve Hopkins/Butterfly.

Here is USATT’s article by Joshua Dyke on the Team event. (Presumably more will be coming on their news page.)

Tipping Off Opponents
Here’s a non-table tennis example (2:50) of baseball hall of famer Pedro Martinez explaining how pitcher Lance McCullers was tipping off his pitches in the world series. But the same thing happens in table tennis. To use one example, I used to coach our players against USATT hall of famer Brian Masters, and they did pretty well. One reason for this was that Brian liked to throw in sudden deep serves – and I noticed that whenever he did this, as he started his serve he’d stick his tongue out of his mouth! We used this for years against him. There are many other less extreme examples. Five-time US Men’s Champion Dan Seemiller once told me that he could often tell what the opponent was serving long before they served. I’ve had the same experience – often you aren’t even sure at first what the “tell” is, you just noticed something’s different whenever they do a certain thing. I used to coach Tong Tong Gong, a member of the US Cadet Team, but it drove him crazy that even after he passed me in rating, I would still beat him every time – because I could read, from his motion, what each of his serves was before he served it. I worked with him on fixing this, but it was so ingrained, and since nobody else seemed to have picked up on it, it didn’t really hurt him. (Example – when he served deep, he lengthened his backswing, and as soon as I saw that, I’d prepare to loop the serve. For heavy backspin, he always opened his racket more during the backswing, while for no-spin or sidespin, it would be more closed.)

Smash Against Lob
Here’s video (48 sec) of Ye Seo Dang smashing against Krisztina Toth. She’s consistent, but her smashes have little power, and so she is unable to win the point. She’s really just looping the ball, with little arm snap. This is an example of what was covered in last week’s Tip of the Week, Increase Forearm Snap to Increase Smashing Speed.

New from Samson Dubina

  • Eugene Wang Quote (2:41) – This is one of those really important things that a lot of players and even coaches don’t really get. I’m always stressing to players to remember their best games or matches, remembering the mindset, and simply repeat it. If you play poorly, put that out of your mind and remember when you played great! (The only exception is when you have to analyze why you played poorly. But that’s strictly a technical analysis.)
  • Placement (5:54)
  • Upset of the Year
  • Paddle Palace Fitness Video of the Month (74 sec)
  • Robot Tips (7:45)
  • Theme (4:11)

Butterfly Training Tips

How Often Should You Use Long Serves?
Here’s the article by Tom Lodziak.

Why Does Fan Zhendong Lose?
Here’s the video (40 sec) from Performance Biomechanics Academy Table Tennis.

Seth Pech Swedish League Match 2022 + Tutorial Two Tricky Serve Returns at the End
Here’s the video (13:39) from Seth, with point-by-point analysis.

How to Serve Attack and Make Backhand Topspin Against Backspin Powerful and Advanced
Here’s the video (23 min) from Ti Long.

Ask the Coach
Here are the latest questions from PingSkills.

New from Steve Hopkins/Butterfly
(See his three articles on Pan Ams in segment above.)

New from USATT

New from ITTF

Steve Moreno Men’s U13 Champion of the WTT Youth Contender Podgorica 2022
Here’s the article by Edgardo Vasquez.

Africa’s Best Player of All Time from Perfect Camera Angles
Here’s the video (2:18) featuring Nigeria’s Quadri Aruna, from Tacobackhand.

Chinese National Championships Team Final
Here’s where you see these great videos from the Chinese Nationals, from ttlondon2012. They include finals matches Fan Zhendong vs. Lin Gaoyuan, Xu Xin vs. Li Yijie, and Fan Zhendong vs. Zhou Qihao, as well as semifinal and quarterfinal matches.

Evaluation of Competition and Travelling Diet of Elite Table Tennis Players
Here’s the scientific journal article from the Netaji Subhas National Institute of Sports from India.

Ping Pong in the LA Crossword
The Los Angeles Times crossword puzzle on Saturday, Nov. 5 included 32 Across, “Game room fixture.” Answer – Ping Pong Table! The crossword also runs in the Washington Post, which I still get and do the crossword at lunch every day.

Novak Djokovic 'Knocked Out' by a Ball Boy in Ping Pong Battle
Here’s the video (27 sec)!

Ping-Pong Is My Therapy
Here are three versions of this shirt that most of us need! (No, I don’t sell these or any other shirts or other non-book items that I link to here.)

Belly-Flop Pong
Here’s the video (12 sec) – it starts with a behind-the-back shot, and then comes the belly flop!

Never Let ‘em Know Your Next Move
Here’s the video (5 sec)!

***
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October 31, 2022

Tip of the Week
Increase Forearm Snap to Increase Smashing Speed.

US Open Hotel – How to Save Lots of Money
I just saved a thousand dollars. How? I will be going to the US Open, Dec. 16-21 in Ontario, CA. The official tournament hotel is the DoubleTree By Hilton Hotel ‐ Ontario Airport, which is 0.3 miles from the playing hall. It looks like a nice hotel, and if you can afford it, go for it!

I will be at the Open for seven nights, Dec. 15-21. At the Doubletree, after taxes, that came to $1576, or $225/night!!! Sorry, that’s way, Way, WAY too much. But I’ve been to every US Open and US Nationals since 1984 (with my first in 1976), so . . . is my streak coming to an end?

Nope, thanks to www.booking.com. It took me just a few minutes to find a number of  cheap hotels nearby. They are not super-nice hotels like the 4-star DoubleTree, but they are fine for my purposes. I’ve actually used booking.com to find such cheap hotels all over the US and Europe many times, saving hordes of money.

I will be staying at the Ramada by Wyndham Ontario, which is 0.7 miles away. The room will be smaller and there will be fewer housekeepers, but it’s a private room bathroom with free WiFi and a 24-hour desk. (See the list of amenities on the hotel page.) I’ve never had a problem with cleanliness or other issues. Cost there is $596 for seven nights, or $85/night. Total savings . . . $980!!!

[Update: I went by the info on the online entry form, which doesn't have a discount code. That's a rather important piece of info to mistakenly leave out! If you use the link from the USATT US Open page, then the cost, after taxes, is $1268, or $181 a night - still a LOT more than the $596 or $85/night I'm paying at the Ramada.]

Some will argue we should support USATT by using their official hotel. There is an argument for that, and I half expect to get a call from USATT asking me to take the above info down. But nobody owes them an extra $980 out of loyalty. In fact, USATT should be promoting cheaper alternatives – let those who can afford it stay at a really nice hotel, while those who can’t afford $225/night and wouldn’t otherwise attend can now attend, thereby supporting USATT with their entry fees. (Besides coaching, I am playing in four events, so I supported USATT to the tune of $300.) I bet a LOT of players aren’t coming due to the hotel costs.

Other cheap local hotels I found include:

  • Ontario Airport Inn, $595/7 nights ($85/night + tax). 0.8 miles away
  • Folk Inn Ontario Airport, $785/7 nights ($112/night + tax), 0.3 miles away
  • Or browse the list yourself. This will take you to a list of hotels in Ontario, CA, for the dates Dec. 15-22. But you can adjust yourself. To find distance from playing hall, use Googlemaps, where I’ve already put in the playing hall for you, the Ontario Convention Center ‐ Ontario, California. Click on “Directions” and put in the hotel’s address, and it’ll give you the distance.

ADDENDUM - Another option was pointed out to me - stay at an airbnb. I'm not really familiar with them, but it seems another inexpensive option. 

Weekend Coaching and Halloween
As usual, I coached in four junior group sessions. There was a lot of emphasis on ball placement – too many shots were going to the middle backhand or forehand instead of wide angles. What you do in practice you will do in a match!!! As usual, there was a focus on active feet. When players were erratic on a shot, I’d remind them to remember the feel and timing of the ones the ones they do correctly and repeat, while forgetting the ones they messed up on. (If you think about the ones you mess up on, guess what your subconscious will be thinking about and emulating?)

Most will be trick or treating tonight. After the last session, I talked to a small group of kids in the 12-15 age group who wondered if they were too old to go trick or treating. I told them a story from when I was twelve. I was all set to go trick or treating with another kid from the neighborhood, Max, who was also twelve. It was always my favorite holiday! But a fourteen-year-old from across the street made fun of us, said trick or treating was for little kids. Even though I badly wanted to go, I decided I was too old, and though Max tried to convince me and even though I had a costume ready, I didn’t go. That night I cried myself to sleep over missing Halloween – I still can’t believe I let that kid from across the street convince me not to go, and it’s bothered me for many decades that I did so, and missed out on that night. As I told the kids, trick or treating is fun, and do it as long as you can – and if you are worried some will think you are too old, well then wear a mask!!!

Halloween Pong

Blast from the Past: 1982 US Nationals Men’s Singles Final - Dan Seemiller vs. Eric Boggan
Here’s the video (57:52), which was recently uploaded. Note that both use the Seemiller grip.( If you want, you can skip right to 50:11, when Eric is serving up 19-16 and see what happens next. In those days, games were to 21 and you served five times each.) In fact, at the 1983 World Championships, four of the five members of the US Team used that grip – Dan, Eric, plus Ricky Seemiller and Brian Masters. The lone exception was Sean O’Neill.

Here are Dan's three books - get 'em now for Christmas!

USATT News
The last USATT news item was from Oct. 20, eleven days, and only two items since Oct. 7, 24 days ago. For many years the USATT news page was the place to go for US table tennis news, but no more. I was once co-webmaster for USATT for about a decade, primarily responsible for creating content, and both in those days and for many years after we kept the site updated regularly with lots of news content. Alas, in modern times USATT has switched to a policy of mostly featuring USATT stuff, and ignoring other US table tennis news. (ITTF has a similar policy, but they have a lot more news to report each week.)

ITTF News

WTT Cup Finals
Here’s the home page for the event, held Oct. 27-30 in Xinxiang, China, with complete results, news, and video. Perhaps the most interesting match was Fan Zhendong vs Dimitrij Ovtcharov in the QF (11:26), where the German pulls off the big upset. (Here’s the full version with full commentary, 33:30.) See more coverage from Steve Hopkins below.

ITTF Pan American Championships
Here’s the home page for the event being held in Santiago, Chile, Oct. 31 – Nov. 6. USA Women’s Team is Sarah Jalli, Rachel Sung, Amy Wang and Lily Zhang. USA Men’s Team is Liang Jishan, Sharon Alguetti, Kanak Jha and Nikhil Kumar.

New from Steve Hopkins/Butterfly

Backhand Middle Backhand Forehand
Here’s the video (79 sec) with Emily Tan.

New from Ti Long

New from Samson Dubina

Falk Beats Harimoto in the Form of His Life
Here’s the video (1:33) from Taco Backhand. Here’s the full match (22:01) from the 2022 WTT Macao. These are two of the best backhands in the world. Note that Falck has short pips on his forehand – and yet, players stay away from that side when they can to avoid his smash. Makes you wonder why more players don’t try short pips on one side.

New from Performance Biomechanics Academy Table Tennis

Ask the Coach
Here are the latest questions from PingSkills.

Singapore Sports School – Learning Table Tennis
Here’s the video (2:22).

Just Another Tahl Rally
Here’s the video (26 sec, but it’s replays after the first ten) as Tahl Leibovitz demonstrates some basic attacking techniques.

Dimitrij Ovtcharov Rates YOUR Crazy Table Tennis Shots!
Here’s the video (5:32) as he judges four crazy shots.

New Table Tennis Music Videos

Custom Table Tennis Cartoon Mug
Here's where you can get it!

Wham! Bam! and Pow! Rackets
I kind of want one.

Ping Pong Table Tennis Neon Sign
Here's where you can get it at Amazon!

Keep the Ball in Play for 60 Seconds, Win £100
Here’s the video (10:21) from Pongfinity!

Ping Pong Trick Shots
Here’s the video (40 sec) – a great compilation!

***
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October 24, 2022

Tip of the Week
Treat Opponents Who Are Not Threats as Threats so They Do Not Become Threats.

Weekend Coaching and Coaching Between Points
I helped run four group junior sessions over the weekend. In three of them I mostly fed multiball – lots of fundamentals. However, once you get beyond the beginning stage, often the most important thing in multiball is feeding backspin so the player can practice looping. Why? It's easy to get lots of practice in topspin rallies with a practice partner, but in a regular drill, once a player loops against backspin, the rest of the rally is mostly all topspin. If you want repetitive practice against backspin, multiball is the way to go. In most of the sessions, players in the group did various drills while I took them three at a time, feeding backspin. (One player does the drill, usually combined with footwork; one shadow-practices behind that player; and the third picks up the balls.)

I spent about 45 minutes in one session walking around while players did game-type drills, and then actual matches at the end. A key thing here is that the coach can interrupt any drill or match to talk to the player on what they need to do differently. That's similar to what happens in many tournament matches these days, ever since they began allowing coaching between points in tournament matches. How has that changed things? In most matches for most players, it's not that big a change, but when junior players with coaches play, especially in international events, it's a huge change. I've had dozens of matches where the opposing coach signaled all or most of the serves, and/or where there's nonstop coaching between every point. (I think this is usually a long-term mistake – how can a kid learn to think for himself if the coach does all the thinking?) Sometimes they use signals - a few times I've deciphered them and took advantage of it.

The bigger problem I face is that often the opposing coach and player speak a language we don't speak, while they know the only language I speak – English. (Sometimes we also work out signals for certain things, but that's limited.) And so I'm often at a disadvantage as the opposing coach can call out advice between every point and we have no idea what he's saying. But I can't do that since they'd hear and understand what I'm saying. Often I've even had other coaches coach matches to make up for this. For example, I coached at international tournaments this past year in Ecuador, Jordan, Austria, and Dominican Republic. Over and over there would be rival coaches and players who would openly coach in various foreign languages, and we'd have no idea what they are saying. But since they often spoke English as a second language, anything I say they would understand. So sometimes, since many of our players and other coaches were Chinese-American, I'd have a Chinese coach do that match so they could coach in Chinese. 

It can backfire. I coached a kid in the semifinals of Under 14 at the US Open one year. The opposing player and coach were Chinese. Throughout the match the opposing coach was coaching in Chinese between points (illegal at the time), and (worse still), the opposing kid was constantly bad-mouthing my player in Chinese. What they didn't know was that the kid I was coaching had been attending Chinese school on weekends with his Chinese friends, and so was fluent in Chinese! And so, throughout the match, we knew what the coach and player was saying. At 9-9 in the fifth, when the opposing player said something nasty, my player told him off in fluent Chinese! I think the other kid turned green. He never recovered – my player won the next two points and went on to win the event.

I was told a similar thing happened at the Worlds or other international tournaments a few times. Atanda Musa was the Nigerian champion and top 30 in the world. One of his teammates had trained in China for several years and so knew Chinese. So when Atanda played the Chinese, he'd arrange for that player to be his coach – and between games, the player/coach would listen intently to what the Chinese coach would say, since he often didn't keep his voice down, assuming Nigerian players didn't know Chinese. And so Atanda did pretty well against those Chinese players!

WTT Champions Macao 2022
Here's the home page for the event held Oct. 19-23 in Macao, China, with complete results, news, and video. (See the extensive coverage of this event below by Steve Hopkins, and USATT article Kanak Jha Sprints Through Round of 32 at WTT Champions Macao.)

WTT Cup Finals Xinxiang 2022
Here's the home page for the event to be held Oct. 27-30 in Xinxiang, China.

Tips and Demo with Sid Naresh for the Forehand Counter
Here's the video (29 sec). Interesting terminology note – I would call these forehand loops, but in the modern game, where players rarely do straightforward forehand counter-hitting, many probably think of looping as a simple counter.

Table Tennis Masterclass
Here's the video (11:56) from Adam Bobrow. His videos are always entertaining (and, believe it or not, he's just reached one million subscribers!), but this one is educational as well. "Olympian and youngest ever US National Champion, Ariel Hsing, shows some of the drills that helped her become a 3-time US National Champion and an Olympian."

Butterfly Training Tips

New from Samson Dubina

New from Ti Long

Give Your Opponent Something to Worry About
Here's the article by Tom Lodziak. "Let’s look at how you can dominate your opponent in the first five shots of each rally…"

Ask the Coach
Here are the latest questions from PingSkills.

New from PingSunday/EmRatThich

New from Taco Backhand

New from Drupe Pong

Table Tennis as a Treatment for Parkinson's
Here's the video (61 sec) from the Performance Biomechanics Academy Table Tennis.

New from Steve Hopkins/Butterfly

Smiling Faces in the Name of NCTTA!
Here's the article from the National Collegiate TTA.

Ni Xialian: An Inspiration for All Generations
Here's the article from Olympics.com. Many years ago, when I was editor of USA Table Tennis Magazine (a print magazine that went to all 8000 or so USATT members), I interviewed her at I think a US Open. Later, when I played a match, I noticed her watching. Afterwards, completely on her own, she came over and offered some tips! (She speaks pretty good English.)

Mountain View Table Tennis Athlete Kef Noorani's Talent Takes Him Abroad
Here's the article from the Mountain View Voice.

Local Para Athlete Sets Sight on World Championships, 2024 Paralympics
Here's the article from the Observer Voice featuring Valerie Rolph.

Watch Google’s Ping-Pong Robot Pull off a 340-hit Rally
Here's the article from techcrunch.com. Here's a related article and series of videos of this robot, i-Sim2Real: Reinforcement Learning of Robotic Policies in Tight Human-Robot Interaction Loops.

New from USATT

New from the ITTF

Ping-Pong Whisper
Here's where you can buy the sweatshirt!

Ping-Pong Ball Christmas Tree Shirt
Here's where you can buy it!

We Built a Mega Table
Here's the video (17 sec)!

Ping Pong Trick Shots
Here's the video (12 sec)!

Hydro and Fluid – Funny Cartoons for Children
Here's the video! It's over 31 minutes, but the table tennis is in the first 30 seconds.

Toddler Pong
Here's the video (14 sec) – make sure sound is turned on so you can hear his laugh!

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October 17, 2022

Tip of the Week
The Yin and Yang of Serving.

Cary Cup Open
I spent the weekend coaching at the Cary Cup at the Triangle Badminton and Table Tennis Club in Cary, NC. Here are complete results of the tournament, care of Omnipong. I was coaching two players, Todd Klinger and Christian Funderberg. I can't really go into details of most of the coaching – call it coach-player privilege – but here are some highlights. Ojo dominates the big events!

  • Yes, if you miss your own serve twice a game, you drop about 100 rating points in level. (It cost us at least two matches.)
  • No, the match is not over if you are up 2-0 in games (twice), or up 9-6, 9-7, or 9-8 in deciding game, or up match point in deuce twice. It was one of those weekends.
  • Yes, in fact, you most certainly should attack the middle and forehand and stop going to the player's really good backhand.
  • No, don't think about the shot, just do it.
  • Yes, it's lucky that Christian and I had the same size shoes and so when his literally broke apart while he was playing, he was able to borrow mine.
  • No, just because he's playing with a hardbat doesn't mean it's going to be an easy match.
  • Yes, if the opponent is a passive receiver, we're going to take advantage of it.
  • No, you cannot call a let after the point is over. (Todd and Christian didn't do this – they know better.)
  • Yes, we discussed and solved every philosophical issue on the five-hour drive home. Later we will publish our annotated discussions in the New York Times.

New from Samson Dubina

New from Ti Long

How Often Should I Change Table Tennis Rubbers
Here's the article by Matt Hetherington.

Forehand Loop & Footwork
Here's the video (48 sec) with Ye Tian

Tournament Update … Steady Progress, But Too Many Missed Opportunities
Here's the article by Tom Lodziak, with some insights from his play.

New from the Performance Biomechanics Academy Table Tennis

New from PingSunday/EmRatThich

New from Taco Backhand

Seth Pech vs Senura Silva 2022 (16:04) Presper Financial Architect Open
Here's the video as Seth gives point-by-point commentary.

Ask the Coach
Here are the latest questions from PingSkills.

New from Steve Hopkins/Butterfly

New from the ITTF

Return Everything Shirt
Here it is!

Famous People Playing Table Tennis
Here's the video (5:06) from Table Tennis Central, which includes Roger Federer, Serena Williams, Bill Gates, Warren Buffett, English football (soccer) players Tom Carroll and Raheem Sterling, Rafael Nadal, Kevin Spacey, and two people at the very end that I don't recognize.

Charlie Cox, Mark Ruffalo, and More Play Ping Pong in New She-Hulk BTS Video
Here's the article and video (15 sec)!

The Miami Dolphins Ping-Pong Odyssey

This is How the Dream Starts
Here's the video (10 sec)!

Most Random Ping Pong Racket
Here's the video (8:19) from Pongfinity! "In today's challenge episode, we're going to play with the world's most uneven racket, see how many papers we can slice with a ping pong ball, and more!"

Mostly Non-Table Tennis
Here are more science fiction & fantasy stories of mine that just came out.

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October 10, 2022

Tip of the Week
Ten Mini-Fixes.

Annexing Moscow
It has come to my attention that the Table Tennis Federation of Russia is in Moscow. While I am sure their players are very good at killing, I'm guessing they are more into killing ping-pong balls than Ukrainians. Therefore, by the power invested in me by USA Table Tennis, I am hereby annexing the city of Moscow. Henceforth, they will be the 51st US state and all residents of the city will be required to join USATT. We will also be granting immediate US citizenship to the 11 Russian men (including world #61 Kirill Skachkov) and 18 women (including #45 Elizabet Abraamian and #49 Polina Mikhailova) who have current ITTF world rankings. And here's Zelensky smashing Putin!

Weekend Coaching
We had the MDTTC October Open this weekend (here are complete results), so my only coaching was a 90-minute session with our novice junior class. As usual, the focus at this level was on fundamentals and fun. One thing that's become a fun routine – just before and after class I do my speed bouncing trick, where I bounce the ball really fast on the table with my paddle. The kids try to stop it – and so I have to move the bouncing to the middle of the table where they can't reach it. So they throw ping-pong balls or slide their paddles at it until I miss. They won't let me have any fun! Of course, I also spend some time trying to convince them that there is no smiling in table tennis – ours is a GRIM sport, where we only allow sadness and griminity. Unfortunately, they don't quite get this part yet, but they do like the made-up word "griminity."

World Table Tennis Team Championships
They were in Chengdu, China, Sept. 30 – Oct. 9. Here's the info page where you can find complete results, schedule, news, and video. Spoiler Alert – once again China swept both events. The best match was probably in the semifinals, where China defeated Japan 3-2, with Tomokazu Harimoto (world #4) winning both matches for Japan, upsetting world #1 Fan Zhendong 11-9 in the fifth, as well as Wang Chuqin (world #11). Harimoto vs. Fan (11:41) is the match to see – and especially this point! (Besides the coverage below, see the videos in the segment from PingSunday/EmRatThich.)

Here is coverage from Steve Hopkin from Butterfly:

Here are three articles on how the USA team did from the USATT news page.

Dan Seemiller's "Smash! Moments, Memories and Tips" Book
A new version in black & white just came out for only $14.99. The other version is full color and costs $30. (Disclosure: I put the pages together for him. I also worked with him on Revelations of a Ping-Pong Champion - his autobiography - and recreating his instructional book from 1996, Winning Table Tennis. Why not get all three?) Here's the back cover text for "Smash!":

This is my 50+-year journey in this greatest of Olympic sports – in pictures.

  • The controversial decision by the referee that changed the match with World #2 Cai Zhenhua from China
  • The 15-day trip to North Korea for the 1979 World Championships. Very strange indeed
  • Defeating the #1 Chinese team 3-0 in doubles at the 1977 World Championships  
  • Reeling off eight consecutive U.S. Men’s Doubles titles with brother Rick
  • The disappointment of losing in two U.S. Open Men’s Singles Finals
  • The miracle comeback to capture U.S. Men’s title #4
  • Dan’s incredible 66-1 record in World Team 2nd division play
  • The thrill of signing a 5-year exclusive racket contract with K-Mart
  • The arrest in Yugoslavia for trespassing
  • Training and competing all over the world
  • Winning five Western Japan Open Men’s Singles titles
  • CBS Challenge of the Sexes and World Racquets Championships
  • And so much more - join me on this tour of a lifetime!

Brian Pace on the Road to Recovery
Here's the GoFundMe page, where Brian's been posting regular updates. I wrote about this in my Sept. 28 blog (third segment). So far they have raised $43,690 of the $100,000 goal.

New from Samson Dubina

New from PingSunday/EmRatThich
Lots of video from the Worlds!

New from Ti Long

New from Taco Backhand

New from Drupe Pong

Fan Zhendong Multiball Training Before World Championships
Here's the video (77 sec).

Training Tips with Hammed Taiwo
Backhand Loop Snap (74 sec).

Ask the Coach
Here are the latest questions from PingSkills.

New from Steve Hopkins/Butterfly
(I've moved his six articles on the World Championships to that segment above.)

New from USA Table Tennis
(I moved their three articles on the Worlds to that segment above.)

New from ITTF

Shortz's Table Tennis Iron Man Streak Reaches 10 Years
Here's the article from The Examiner News.

Ping-Pong Champion Shirts from Amazon
Here they are!

Table Tennis Comic Royalty-Free Images
Here they are! My favorites are Hippo-Pong, Angry Bunny Pong, and Ping-Pong Explosion. If you have a table tennis webpage, why not add one or more of these to liven things up?

Baby Pong
Here's Baby Ciz! (Here's the non-Facebook version.) He looks pretty hungry! (Here's the non-Facebook version.) Note that he's a hardbatter – no looping in his future!

Table Tennis on the Arctic Ocean
Here's the video (35 sec)!

1 vs. 2
Here's the video (11:49) from Adam Bobrow! "Joanna and Rachel Sung are excellent players and admirable people! After playing them in singles, I had to try DOUBLES!"

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October 3, 2022

Tip of the Week
The Larry Line.

Weekend Coaching
I coached in four group sessions over the weekend, each 90 minutes long. The kids kept asking me, "Where have you been?" since I'd missed the last two weekends since I was down in Santo Domingo (see segment below on Pam Ams). I quizzed them – none knew where Santo Domingo was, and only about one-third knew where the Dominican Republic was. (This was mostly ages 8-12.) Now they all know.

One drill we did in one session was simple – one player served backspin, other player pushed to backhand, server forehand or backhand looped at the receiver's elbow, receiver blocked or counterlooped, and server just caught the ball or grabbed another from a box and repeated. This allowed the server to rapid-fire work on both looping against backspin and attacking the middle, while the other player worked on covering the middle. Many players, when trying to go to the middle, hit the ball so it goes through the middle of the table, but by the time it reaches the opponent, it's on their backhand side. I explained and showed them how, to get at the opponent's middle (midpoint between forehand and backhand, roughly the playing elbow),  when hitting from the backhand side, the ball had to go through the opponent's forehand side so that when it reached the opponent, it would be at their elbow. (This is for righty vs. righty.)

I had an interesting speed-walk situation. While doing the above drill I looked across the room and saw a girl who had looped with her left foot back. (She was a righty.) I did sort of a double-take – I knew she was trained better than that, so I thought it was just a fluke shot. She did it again, and I started walking to her table. She did it a third time, and now I basically speed-walked to the table and pointed out the problem. She wasn't sure where she'd picked up that habit, but went back to doing it properly the rest of the session.

During a multiball session, one kid kept finding chances to practice his backhand serve, but wasn't quite doing it right. So I rearranged the schedule so I could spend a few minutes with him on it. (He was serving too much in front, so not getting the torque you get is you rotate sideways for this serve.) He was fascinated to discover you could do different spins with the same motion – backspin, side-backspin, sidespin, and side-top.

We have one para junior player who uses long pips on his backhand. When we did a backhand pushing drill, the girl he was hitting with had trouble pushing against the no-spin and light topspins that his pips returned when he pushed, and she kept popping them up. At first, I showed her how to chop down on it to keep it low. But then I had a better idea - I had her alternate backhand topspin and backhand push. When she topspinned, she got a backspin ball which she could push; when she pushed, she got a light topspin ball back that she could topspin. This simulated for both of them the type or rallies they might face in a tournament.

US Open Entry Form
Here is the 2022 US Open Home page, with the entry form linked. It will be held Dec. 16-21 in Ontario, California, near LA. I will, of course, be there, both coaching and likely playing some hardbat events. (I normally use sponge, but like to play hardbat events at big tournaments.) As I've done with every US Open and Nationals entry form starting in 1999, USATT sent it to me for proofing, and as usual I found a bunch of things to fix. (I'm one of those weird ones who, while reading a book, will on page 200 suddenly exclaim, "But that contradicts what it said on page 10!") My first US Open was in 1976, the year I started playing. I've been to every US Open and Nationals since 1984, and several before that.

World Table Tennis Team Championships
They are taking place right now in Chengdu, China, Sept. 30 – Oct. 9. Here's the info page where you can find complete results, schedule, news, and video. The USATT News page is doing coverage of Team USA, with one article up so far, USA Begins World Teams with Victories over Thailand and Canada. (Also see articles on Worlds in segment below from Steve Hopkins/Butterfly.)

Pan Am Under 11 & Under 13 Championships
Below are links to the articles on the Pan Ams by myself and Lifeng Yu. I linked to the Teams articles last week, but the Singles and Doubles articles are new. I was down in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, from Sept. 15-25 as one of the USA Team coaches.

Review of Table Tennis Tactics for Thinkers
Here's the review by Samson Dubina. "Table Tennis Tactics for Thinkers is one of the best table tennis books that I have ever read. I feel that players of all levels can benefit from the details of serve tactics, receive tactics, rallying tactics, doubles tactics, and tactics against various grips, rubbers, and styles."

Best Table Tennis Blogs You Should Know
TableTennisCoaching.com is #2 in the World!!! From PingSunday/EmRatThich

First Galactic Table Tennis Championship
It has come to my attention that not everyone has bought a copy of First Galactic Table Tennis Championships, which came out a few weeks ago. What's wrong with you??? C'mon, it's like $5 for a print copy, the minimum Amazon would let me charge for it. It takes place about 100 years from now, and table tennis has spread to the galaxy – and the title pretty much tells you what it’s about. Yes, the aliens are coming! (To Beijing, to be specific, where the Championships will be held.) I had a lot of fun imagining various alien TT players, including the Ith, who are like giraffes but with arms just under their head, so instead of moving to the ball, they just move their heads on their long necks. Here’s the back cover description:

Li Yi is a member of the Chinese National Table Tennis Team and the best woman in the world. She has trained long hours since she was a child. But now she faces her biggest challenge – aliens! Table tennis has spread to the galaxy and alien players now dominate the sport. The best are the giraffe-like Ith, with their dominating champion Egrayu.

But Earth isn't part of it, not since the cowboy Americans colonized a moon in the Ith home system, which led to a blockade of Earth. The Chinese hope to reopen trade with the galaxy by using "Ping-Pong Diplomacy" – by running the first Galactic Table Tennis Championships in Beijing. Li, her teammates, and the American champion Danny See – a literal cowboy –  play aliens of all shapes and sizes, including the seemingly unbeatable Egrayu, as they battle for the biggest cash prize in table tennis history. But Li is drawn into a corrupt conspiracy that will shake the very foundations of honor and sportsmanship. Plus, there's that problem with the Chinese dumplings…

New from Samson Dubina

How to Backhand Loop
Here's the tutorial (37:02) from Seth Pech.

New from Ti Long

New from PingSunday/EmRatThich

New from Performance Biomechanics Academy Table Tennis

How Do You Come Back from a Tough Loss?
Here's the article by Lily Zhang.

The Surprising Power of a No-Spin Serve
Here's the article by Tom Lodziak.

How to Win the Serve | Trick to know where the umpire has the ball 
Here's the video (1:52) from Pingispagarna.

Ask the Coach
Here are the latest questions from PingSkills.

New from TacoBackhand

Personality Traits and Motives in Table Tennis Players
Here's the scholarly article from Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute (MDPI). "This study aims to investigate table tennis players’ personality traits and motives in the frame of the Big Five personality model and the self-determination theory (SDT) of motivation. A total of 447 Italian table tennis players ranging in level of play between the regional and international levels participated in the study."

New from Steve Hopkins/Butterfly

Seven Days at the 2022 U19 Pan Ams
Here's the article by Sally Moyland.

Butterfly San Antonio Fall Open Results And Tournament Report
Here's the article by Vlad Farcas.

New from USA Table Tennis

New from the ITTF

New from the Malong Fanmade Channel
Lots of new videos here.

Roger Federer Warm-ups with Ping Pong Dressed as James Bond for Laver Cup
Here's the article and video from Tennis World USA! Yes, he has a forehand, and did you see the backhand at the end? And yes, his opponent is faking Rafael Nadal groaning as he hits! (Here's a related story, Why we should all follow Roger Federer’s ping pong lead, from Stuff.co.)

iPhone 7 vs iPhone 11 Table Tennis Match
Here's the video (5:50) from PingSkills! (With Panda bear officiating.)

Who Needs a Net?
Here's the video (6 sec but repeats)!

Return My Serve, Win £100 [London]
Here's the video (10:09) from Pongfinity!

Pong with Anything
Here's the video (25 sec) as two use whatever's available in the basement as rackets!

Tiny Tennis Players on Ping Pong Table
Here's the cartoon!

T-Rex Hates Table Tennis T-Shirt, Button, Sticker, Coffee Cup, Mask
Here they are!

The Man The Myth The Ping Pong Legend T-Shirt
Here it is!

SF & Fantasy Stories
I've had a flurry of stories coming out in the world of science fiction and fantasy, my sideline outside table tennis. A common question I get is, "How much do you pay to get them published?" It's the other way around – magazines pay me to publish my stories, with fees ranging from $50 to $500 for a story. (And note the ping-pong ball mention in "Christmas Interrupted"!)

  • "Packing List for the Invasion" came out last week in Daily Science Fiction. The story is literally told through an alien's packing list for the invasion . . . of Earth. (I had another story there on Sept. 9, "Soul Testing in Major League Baseball.")
  • "Christmas Interrupted" in the Christmas Gothic Short Stories anthology. It's thousands or millions of years in the future and humankind is extinct, but Santa, suffering from Alzheimer's, is still trying to deliver presents to children every year, to the extreme annoyance of his aging elves. A darkly comic story, with a surprise ending that many will find touching. A ping-pong ball has a major impact on the story!
  • "Rationalized" in the Compelling Science Fiction anthology. A dystopian society requires everyone to have an operation when they turn 13 to remove the parts of the brain responsible for emotion. An underground that avoided the operation fights back - and their leader faces an impossible decision. Probably the best tear-jerker I've ever written.
  • I have several more coming out this Fall, including "The Vampire on the Tesseract Wall," coming Oct. 11 from Dark Matter Magazine. What happens when 4-D being collects 3-D beings as a hobby – and mistakenly captures a powerful vampire? It's a mashup of SF and dark fantasy.
  • And, of course, there's First Galactic Table Tennis Championships, my SF novelette – see segment above! (If you want something a little longer, try The Spirit of Pong, my fantasy table tennis novel.)

***
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September 26, 2022

Tips of the Week

Pan Am Under 11 & Under 13 Championships and a Short Blog
I just returned from ten days in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, where I was one of the USA Team coaches for the Pan Am Under 11 & Under 13 Championships, along with Qi Wei, Wu "Jennifer" Yue, Xinhue "Taylor" Wang, Cheng Yinghua, and Thilina Piyadasa. We won 9 of the 16 golds, plus 7 silvers and 4 bronze! (Here's a team picture.) I coached both Under 11 (Hopes) and Under 13 boys (Mini-Cadets), with four players in each, but was in charge of Under 11 boys. The Under 11 Boys' Squad (Kyler Chen, Jason Liu, Caillou Chen, and Arjun Kumar) won gold and bronze in Boys' Teams (the two teams had to play each other in the semis or it might have been an all-USA final), gold in Boys' Doubles, Gold in Mixed Doubles, and silver and bronze in Boys' Singles. See below for my more extensive writeups.

The current human population on this planet is about 7.8 billion, and all but one of them messaged me during the ten days I was away, asking if I could do something for them. What, you weren't one of them? Then you are the only one who didn't. (I was also messaged for help by a number of chimpanzees, gorillas, blue whales, dolphins, giant squid, and a grey parrot from Uganda with questions on proper forewing technique.)

Because of this rather long todo list, this will be a short blog. However, I've got two lengthy articles on the USATT news page about the USA Boys' Teams in Santo Domingo, with two more coming in the next day on singles and doubles play. (LiFeng Yu has two articles on Girls' Teams, with another coming on singles and doubles.) Here are those articles – make sure to check back tomorrow when the rest should go up.

Brian Pace GoFundMe – On the Road to Recovery
Coach and former championship player Brian Pace was recently in a terrible bicycle accident. If you'd like to help, here is the GoFundMe page, which has so far raised about $39,000, with a $100,000 goal. Any help would be appreciated. (See Brian's updates.) How did it happen?

Brian was on his weekly 5 am training ride where he had the right of way at an intersection. A work van took a left turn in front of Brian, striking him on his left side and knocking him down an incline where he was only stopped by hitting a cluster of trees. His bike lay close to him with his shoes still clipped into the pedals

The driver of the van attempted to help Brian but could not due to Brian's injuries. The fire and rescue teams were first on the scene, followed by the paramedics and police. They worked to remove his helmet, placed him on the gurney, and finally got him into the ambulance to be transported to Wake Med Trauma Center.

Injury Assessment
Brian's x-rays revealed extensive injuries: 1) Multiple fractures and dislocation of the hip socket and pelvis, 2) Multiple left rib fractures, 3) Broken Left Arm, 4) Broken Right Knee, 5) 5" laceration on the left hand, and 6) 4" laceration on left knee

Here are some other pages you might check out.

Bounce the Ball, Win $1000
Here's the video (10:48) from Pongfinity! They challenged about 30 players to bounce the ball on their paddles as long as they could, with whoever went longest winning $1000! As someone commented on the video, this is more of a mental exercise. Toward the end, they began to do things to distract them or raise the difficulty level, such as having to lift one leg. (Otherwise, a good player could do this essentially forever, until they lost their focus or their arm got too tired.)

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September 12, 2022

Next Blog
Next blog will be Monday, Sept. 26. I’m out of town Sept. 15-25 coaching US junior team in Santo Domingo (see segment below).

Tip of the Week
Consistency is King.

First Galactic Table Tennis Championship
It’s finally here! No, not the actual first galactic table tennis championship, but my new novelette, “First Galactic Table Tennis Championships”! It’s in both print and kindle formats. It’s about 10,000 words, about 40 pages double spaced. It takes place about 100 years from now, and table tennis has spread to the galaxy – and the title pretty much tells you what it’s about. Yes, the aliens are coming! (To Beijing, to be specific, where the Championships will be held. Only Open Singles, no women’s events.) Cost is only $5 for a print copy within 1-2 days, or $3 for kindle. (Gee, I wonder who “Danny See” is named after?) I had a lot of fun imagining various alien TT players, including the Ith, who are like giraffes but with arms just under their head, so instead of moving to the ball, they just move their heads on their long necks! It’s a huge advantage. Here’s the back cover description:

Li Yi is a member of the Chinese National Table Tennis Team and the best woman in the world. She has trained long hours since she was a child. But now she faces her biggest challenge – aliens! Table tennis has spread to the galaxy and alien players now dominate the sport. The best are the giraffe-like Ith, with their dominating champion Egrayu.

But Earth isn't part of it, not since the cowboy Americans colonized a moon in the Ith home system, which led to a blockade of Earth. The Chinese hope to reopen trade with the galaxy by using "Ping-Pong Diplomacy" – by running the first Galactic Table Tennis Championships in Beijing. Li, her teammates, and the American champion Danny See – a literal cowboy –  play aliens of all shapes and sizes, including the seemingly unbeatable Egrayu, as they battle for the biggest cash prize in table tennis history. But Li is drawn into a corrupt conspiracy that will shake the very foundations of honor and sportsmanship. Plus, there's that problem with the Chinese dumplings…

Regarding the thing about the Chinese dumplings, this is a takeoff on an actual experience I had many years ago, except it was cheeseburgers – here's the story on that. Many of the incidents that take place in the story are taken from my own playing and coaching career.

ITTF Pan Am Under 11 & Under 13 Championships in Santo Domingo
I’ll be in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, Sept. 15-25, as one of the coaches of the US Junior Teams at the ITTF Pan Am Under 11 & Under 13 Championships. The other coaches are Wei Qi, Wu Yue, Xinyue “Taylor” Wang, Thilina Piyadasa, and Cheng Yinghua (team leader). In the team competition, I’ll be coaching the Under 11 Boys’ Team. Once they get to singles and doubles, they usually have a number of them play at the same time, so coaches coach others from outside the team we’re in charge of. I have extensive notes on many of our opponents from competitions this past year in Ecuador, Jordan, and more recently in Austria in May, which I’ll share with the other coaches when we play them. US Head Coach Gao Jun has been working with us in preparing for the event, including two Zoom meetings (one last night). Here’s the complete team listing:

  • Under 13 Boys (Coach Wei Qi): Ryan Lin (2200), Winston Wu (2181), Kef Noorani (2092), Dhruv Chopra (2105)
  • Under 13 Girls (Coach Wu Yue): Amina Batkhuyag (2231), Aria Shi (2106), Genelia William (2034), Mandy Yu (2072)
  • Under 11 Boys (Coach Larry Hodges): Kyler Chen (2045), Jason Liu (1970), Caillou Chen (1929), Arjun Kumar (1981)
  • Under 11 Girls (Coach Xinyue "Taylor" Wang): Sophia Chen (1886), Abigail Yu (1886), Tiana Piyadasa (1919), Irene Yeoh (1897)
  • Team Leader: Cheng Yinghua. Volunteer Coach: Thilina Piyadasa

MDTTC Open and Weekend Coaching
Here are the results of the MDTTC Open. Coach Wang Qingliang now runs these – I retired from running tournaments in 2019 after running 203 USATT tournament. Alas, he had to go somewhere Sunday night, so I ran it the last four hours. Just when I think I’m out . . . they pull me back in. They also had a computer problem and so had to run the entire tournament off my laptop. Meanwhile, due to the tournament we only had one junior group session, for the Novice class. Lots of multiball!

New from Samson Dubina

New from EmRatThich/PingSunday

New from Taco Backhand

Worried About Winning or Losing? Set Yourself a Different Goal
Here’s the article from Tom Lodziak.

Ti Long Guides and Corrects Forehand Push Technical Errors for Swedish Students
Here’s the video (15:19). Most of it has English subtitles, and some is in English.

Ask the Coach
Here are the latest questions from PingSkills.

New from USA Table Tennis

New from Steve Hopkins/Butterfly

North Carolina Table Tennis Hall of Fame
Here’s the video (6:37) of Ty Hoff’s induction into the North Carolina Table Tennis Hall of Fame. Ty and I won hardbat doubles at the US Open or US Nationals eight times! Here’s the complete list of the 2022 inductees. (Here’s the non-Facebook version.) Here’s the news item on the inaugural 2021 inductees. (I don't have a video of the whole ceremony.) 

My Experience At The U13 US Team Trials
Here’s the article by Kef Noorani

New from ITTF

New from the Malong Fanmade Channel
Lots of new videos here.

Truls Moregardh vs Elias Ranefur | FINAL | Sweden Tour Masters 2022
Here’s the video (6:44).

Rules in Para Table Tennis
Here’s the video (4:52). It’s in Swedish, but with English subtitles. With Swedish national para team players David Olsson and Peter Molander.

25 Table Tennis Cartoons from Cartoonstock
Here they are!

Never Underestimate an Old Man Who Plays Ping Pong
If the heading fits, this is the shirt for you! I can’t find one for “Woman,” but here’s Never Underestimate a Girl Who Plays Table Tennis. And how about Never Underestimate an Old Man Who Plays With Long Pips?

The Point Isn’t Over Until the Point Is Over
Here’s the video (16 sec) - watch that last shot and the premature celebration!

Win 1 Point, Win $100
Here’s the video (15:14) as Adam Bobrow once again entertains while promoting table tennis – and giving away hordes of money!

Non-Table Tennis - Soul Testing in Major League Baseball
My story "Soul Testing in Major League Baseball" came out last Friday at Daily Science Fiction! It's a satire on drug testing and the steroids scandal in baseball. Forget steroids - what happens when major league baseball players illegally sell their souls to Satan to become stars? Finding ways to test for souls leads to an ever-escalating battle between players and Major League Baseball. If you like it, don't forget to rate it! (Come to think of this, is this really non-table tennis? There was at least one case of a suspension in table tennis due to steroids usage, so who knows how many others have sold their souls to the Satan in return for power loops and footwork?)

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September 5, 2022

Tip of the Week
The Simplicity of Tactics.

Weekend Coaching
I coached in four group junior sessions this weekend, one on Saturday, three on Sunday, all 90 minutes. (We have 65 kids in our junior program, divided into four groups by level. Most meeting twice a week for 90 minutes, while the strongest group meets three times a week for two hours, plus smaller sessions after school.) Other coaches in the sessions included Wang Qingliang, Lidney Castro, and Vikash Sahu, with Cheng Yinghua and Jack Huang doing private sessions separately.

I was a practice partner for one of the sessions, where the players rotated around so I blocked for them while they did footwork drills. The kids really improve this way. For some reason, I felt energized the whole session – perhaps after seven days in Texas, 17 in Mexico, and the day before in Chicago (see segment at end), I was craving TT?

Using this newfound energy, I was all over the place in another session as a "walk around" coach, jumping on the kids (not literally) to have active feet, to control their placements, to focus on consistency, and so on.

Especially at the higher levels, I'm a strong advocate of doing drills that allow you to zero in on and practice specific techniques and rallies that you use in an actual match. I discussed this with two of the coaches, with some suggestions on specific players and drills. I noticed that one of our top junior players tends to dominate in one type of rally that he often gets into, but that he may not be doing enough drills that allow him to practice this specific strength. In his last few tournaments he hasn't dominated as well in these rallies as he has in the past – hopefully we can focus on that so that he can continue to dominate with it, and at even higher levels.

One of our top juniors said his arm was bothering him, and will probably take a few days off at least. When this happens, you have to figure out of it's serious or not and whether he should see a doctor; make sure the player doesn't do anything to aggravate the problem; and figure out the source of the problem – a technique problem, overuse, or a fluke injury from some mishap, either in table tennis or out.

During a break in one group, I nonchalantly did my "blowing the ball" trick. Here's video of the trick, from an interview I did in 2020 with Kevin Nguyen. (The link should take you to 38:45.) Notice that I'm not just blowing the ball up, but I'm blowing it sideways - and somehow, magically, it just floats in mid-air! Immediately I was surrounded by kids demanding to know how I did it. Alas, we were in a table tennis session, not a blow-ping-pong-balls session, and the other coaches were already looking at me with "What are you doing?" looks. So I told them if they wanted to learn, we could do it after class. At the end of the session, they all ran over – and so we had a 15-minute session where I taught the trick and they practiced it! (Due to Covid, I hadn't been doing this trick for a while, so it was new to a lot of them. I used to do it all the time.) The parent love how I explain the physics of how I blow the ball sideways by spinning the ball – it's the same principle that makes a topspin ball drop, a sidespin curve sideways, and a backspin float. Since so many people ask me how to do this, I've decided to write it up as a Tip of the Week!

First Galactic Table Tennis Championships
My new novelette (basically a short novel) will be out next week! It combines my two worlds of table tennis and science fiction. I'll give the link in my blog next Monday. Below is the back cover text that explains the story. Regarding the thing about the Chinese dumplings, this is a takeoff on an actual experience I had many years ago, except it was cheeseburgers – here's the story on that. And here's the cover!
=>BREAKING NEWS - First Galactic Table Tennis Championships is on sale now at Amazon, paperback or kindle!

Li Yi is a member of the Chinese National Table Tennis Team and the best woman in the world. She has trained long hours since she was a child. But now she faces her biggest challenge – aliens! Table tennis has spread to the galaxy and alien players now dominate the sport. The best are the giraffe-like Ith, with their dominating champion Egrayu.

But Earth isn't part of it, not since the cowboy Americans colonized a moon in the Ith home system, which led to a blockade of Earth. The Chinese hope to reopen trade with the galaxy by using "Ping-Pong Diplomacy" – by running the first Galactic Table Tennis Championships in Beijing. Li, her teammates, and the American champion Danny See – a literal cowboy –  play aliens of all shapes and sizes, including the seemingly unbeatable Egrayu, as they battle for the biggest cash prize in table tennis history. But Li is drawn into a corrupt conspiracy that will shake the very foundations of honor and sportsmanship. Plus, there's that problem with the Chinese dumplings…

JOOLA Global Championship
They were held this past weekend in Orlando, FL. Here are the results (go to dropdown menu at top and choose "2022 JOOLA Global Championship").

USATT Board Meeting on Tuesday
They will have a Zoom meeting Tuesday, Sept. 6 at 8PM eastern time. Here's the USATT Agenda and Notices page, with a link to the agenda and how you can join in. USATT members are welcome to attend, though they cannot speak without permission of the chair. (They used to have the standard Zoom comments section for anyone, but they didn't like the comments there and so no longer allow that.) Here's the current agenda, subject to change:

  • US Performance Center (Ike Belk)
  • Report of the Chief Executive Officer
  • Audit Committee Report
  • Next Board Meeting Set for December 5, 2022
  • Executive Session

New from Samson Dubina

Butterfly Training Tips

USA Nationals Men's R16 + How to Backhand Flip After Serve Tutorial
Here's the video (12:43) from Seth Pech. "Seth Pech vs Dan Liu Men's R16 2022 USA Nationals Texas" – Seth gives another great tactical analysis.

New from Ti Long

New from PingSunday/EmRatThich

Ask the Coach
Here are the latest questions from PingSkills.

USATT News

New from Steve Hopkins

ITTF News

Taco Backhand

New from Table Tennis Central

Awesome Table Tennis Short Videos
Here's their video page.

New from the Malong Fanmade Channel
Lots of new videos here.

Puerto Rico- Third Place Global In The 2022 ITTF Pan American Cadet Championships U15
Here's the article by Edgardo Vázquez.

"Fear My Racket" Table Tennis Shirt
Here it is!

Sitting Down on the Lob
Here's the video (40 sec), also with other trick shots!

Saturday Evening Post Table Tennis Cartoons
Here they are!

Non-Table Tennis - World Science Fiction Convention
I flew up to Chicago on Friday morning, returning late that night, for the World Science Fiction Convention. It was primarily a "business" trip where I met with three publishers. One of them is reprinting my science fiction novel "Campaign 2100: Game of Scorpions" (which had gone out of print at the previous publisher, and has multiple table tennis scenes) – I'm hoping this publisher will promote it like crazy!!! (They also did a lot of proofing of it, and I will be spending a number of hours this week going over the edits.) I met with two others about upcoming short stories, and I've been commissioned to write one, a sequel to a previous published story, "Nanogod," which was published last year in Dark Matter Magazine. I also discussed with one a possible satirical political book I might write – let's just say Trump fans won't approve. :) August was a good month for my SF writing career - I sold three stories and two others are "finalists." 
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